A telephone that consecutively displays caller telephone numbers using a simple operation.
1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a telephone that uses caller telephone numbers received from a telephone number forwarding service.
2. Background Art
In recent years, various features have been added to telephones, making them into sophisticated devices. At the same time, telephone companies are continually introducing new services.
One new service provided by telephone companies is the xe2x80x98Telephone Number Forwarding Servicexe2x80x99. This service, also called xe2x80x98CMSxe2x80x99 (Call Management Service) or CID (Caller ID), is a service where a telephone exchange transmits telephone numbers of callers to a telephone at the receiving end. To date, this service has already been put into practice by some telephone companies in the United States of America and Canada, and is also being implemented in Japan. This service enables telephone number data for a caller (also called CMS data), along with such information as a time and a caller name, to be transmitted as data. This takes place at a transmission rate of 1200 bits per second in an interval between the first and second rings (call signals) of an incoming call.
The telephone at the receiving end displays a telephone number on a display unit based on this data, so that a user can identify a caller before answering the call. In addition, such data can be accumulated in the telephone at the receiving end and instantly referred to by the user using the display unit.
FIG. 11 is a drawing showing display images of caller telephone numbers in a conventional telephone. This example shows a case in which caller telephone numbers, names and times for five calls are stored inside the telephone. As shown in the drawing, there are three kinds of display image: a xe2x80x98standbyxe2x80x99 image, a xe2x80x98name/telephone numberxe2x80x99 image and a xe2x80x98timexe2x80x99 image. The xe2x80x98standbyxe2x80x99 image marks the boundary between the display information for different calls.
These display images are switched using a xe2x80x98xcex94xe2x80x99 key and a xe2x80x98∇xe2x80x99 key provided for use as telephone number review keys on an operating unit. In other words, each time the xe2x80x98xcex94xe2x80x99 key or the xe2x80x98∇xe2x80x99 key is pressed by the user, the display images change one at a time.
When using such a conventional technique however, the user needs to press a key three times in order to check a telephone number for one call, which makes user operation troublesome, particularly if many telephone numbers have been accumulated. For instance, 15 key presses are required in order to check the telephone numbers for five calls. Here, even if the nonessential xe2x80x98standbyxe2x80x99 image is not displayed, two key presses are needed to change the xe2x80x98name/telephone numberxe2x80x99 and xe2x80x98timexe2x80x99 images successively for one call. When many calls have been accumulated, the operation will still be troublesome for the user.
3. Disclosure of the Invention
In order to solve these problems, the present invention aims to provide a telephone that makes it possible to check caller telephone numbers and caller information transmitted from a telephone number forwarding service by means of a simple user operation.
A telephone that achieves these objectives includes the following structure. A storage unit stores a plurality of pieces of caller information transmitted by a telephone number forwarding service. An input unit receives a user input via a key press. A detecting unit detects a first operation and a second operation made into the input unit. A first display control unit controls an alternating display of a first display image and a second display image on the display unit using a content of the storage unit and in response to a first operation. The first display image includes one piece of caller information and the second display image includes other display information. A second display control unit controls continuous display of a first display image on the display unit by consecutively updating caller information displayed in the first display image using a content of the storage unit and in response to the second operation. Using this construction, troublesome key operations are unnecessary and the user can have caller information displayed consecutively. In addition, pieces of caller information can be displayed both one by one and consecutively, by using the first and second operations as required.
The telephone also includes the following structure. A storage unit stores a plurality of caller telephone numbers transmitted by a telephone number forwarding service. An input unit receives a user input via a key press. A detecting unit detects a first operation and a second operation made into the input unit. A first display control unit controls an alternating display of a first display image and a second display image on the display unit using a content of the storage unit and in response to a first operation. The first display image includes a caller telephone number and the second display image includes other display information. A second display control unit controls continuous display of a first display image on the display unit by consecutively updating caller telephone numbers displayed in the first display image using a content of the storage unit and in response to the second operation. Using this construction, troublesome key operations are unnecessary, and the user can have caller telephone numbers displayed consecutively. In addition, caller telephone numbers can be displayed both one by one and consecutively by using the first and second operations as required.
The storage unit further stores flags indicating whether a display of each caller telephone number has already been controlled by one of the first display control unit and the second display control unit. The second display control unit controls a consecutive display by the display unit of a sequence of first display images including as-yet-undisplayed caller telephone numbers, and a sequence of caller telephone numbers including already displayed caller telephone numbers. By using this structure, the telephone can display as-yet-undisplayed caller telephone numbers and already displayed caller telephone numbers separately.
The second display control unit further controls the display of a first guide display image between the display of first display images including as-yet-undisplayed caller telephone numbers and first display images including already displayed caller telephone numbers. The first guide display image indicates a boundary between the as-yet-undisplayed and already displayed first display images. If this structure is used, a user can confirm whether a first display image is as-yet-unchecked or already checked by using the first guide display image.
When all caller telephone numbers in the storage unit have been displayed, the second display control unit further displays a second guide display image indicating that all caller telephone numbers have been displayed. Using this construction, when a user can confirm whether all calls have been displayed by using a second guide image when performing continual display using the second operation.
The detecting unit includes a short press detecting unit and a long press detecting unit. The short press detecting unit detects in the input unit, as a first operation, a press of a specified key shorter than a specified time. The long press detecting unit detects that the pressing of the specified key has exceeded the specified time and, after the specified time has been exceeded, detects at fixed intervals that the specified key continues to be pressed. In this way, a first operation and a second operation can be performed by a simple operation in which a user presses a specified key for a time that is shorter or longer than a specified time.
The second display control unit further includes a display processing unit and a display updating unit. When the pressing of the specified key has been detected as exceeding the specified time, the display processing unit has a first display image including one of the caller telephone numbers stored in the storage unit displayed on a display unit. When the pressing of the specified key has been detected as continuing, the display updating unit updates the caller telephone number of the first display image with another telephone number stored in the storage unit. In this way, the telephone updates caller telephone numbers stored in the storage unit one by one at fixed intervals while the specified key continues to be pressed.
Every time a first operation is detected, the first display control unit changes one of a currently displayed first display image and second display image for another display image. In this way, a user can check a different first or second display image to the first or second display image currently being displayed by using a first operation.
The storage unit further stores names corresponding to the caller telephone numbers, and the display processing unit and display updating unit have first display images including caller telephone numbers and names corresponding to the caller telephone numbers displayed on the display unit. In this way, a user can check names corresponding to caller telephone numbers.
9. In the telephone of claim 6,* the storage unit further stores flags that indicate whether each caller telephone number has already been displayed by one of the first display control unit and the second display control unit. The second display control unit has the control unit consecutively display, with reference to the flags, as-yet-undisplayed caller telephone numbers and already displayed caller telephone numbers.
10. In the telephone of claim 9,* the second display control unit further controls a display of a guide display image between the as-yet-undisplayed and the already displayed caller telephone numbers, the guide display image indicating a boundary between the as-yet-undisplayed caller telephone numbers and the already displayed caller telephone numbers. The display control unit further controls a display of a second guide display image when all caller telephone numbers in the storage unit have been displayed, the second guide display image indicating that all caller telephone numbers have been displayed.
The parts of the sentence before each asterisk are unnecessary and should have been deleted from the Japanese. 
The display updating unit includes a retrieving unit and a display updating unit. When the pressing of the specified key has been detected as continuing, the retrieving unit retrieves from the storage unit a caller telephone number stored in a storage area following a storage area of the caller telephone number currently being displayed. The display updating unit updates the caller telephone number of the first display image with the caller telephone number retrieved by the retrieving unit. In this way, the telephone updates the display of caller telephone numbers one at a time, at fixed intervals and in the order in which the numbers are stored in the storage area, while a specified key continues to be pressed.